1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to enclosures for animals. More particularly, it relates to enclosures for small animals including amphibians, fish, reptiles and small mammals. Provisions are made for maintaining a plurality of individual enclosures in a modular space-efficient interchangeable system, whereby the environment in each enclosure may be individually adjusted. The particular applicability of this invention lies in the field of experimental investigations involving animals, and its primary interest is toward experimenters with those animals that require a controlled balance between wet and dry environments.
It has applicability to the housing of amphibians which may be strictly aquatic, for example the African clawed toad or the axolotl, or the truly amphibious animals such as the leopard frog and some salamanders and newts, or the primarily terrestrial animals such as toads and some salamanders It is also adaptable for fish, reptiles or small mammals and may be utilized as an aquarium or a terrarium.
In addition to its primary interest to experimenters, it is applicable to education, animal fanciers, dealers, zoos, commercial breeders and the like.
2. Prior Art
No prior enclosures or system of enclosures is known which combines the wide range of advantages of the present invention, and it is believed that all earlier known expedients have certain disadvantages which are overcome by the present invention. Representative earlier U.S. Pat. Nos. of interest include: 2,126,056; 2,524,229; 2,881,733; 3,074,375; 3,127,872 and 3,177,848. Earlier publications include Nace, in BioScience 18:767775, 1968 and Nace, et al in "Guidelines for the Breeding, Care and Management of Laboratory Animals", I.L.A.R. (NAS/NRC), Washington, D.C., and Culley in Lab Animal 5:30-36, 1976.